- Should government invest more in transport infrastructure? Or spend more on healthcare projects?
- Who will benefit and who will lose from public projects?
- What are the likely environmental consequences of public investment?
These are typical of the questions that rise in cost-benefit analysis, the most developed evaluation technique and aid to decision making in the public sector. This book addresses these and many other questions in a thorough and thoughtful manner. The key concepts are presented in an accessible way and applied examples are used to illustrate the concepts. The book balances the practice and theory, the art and science, of cost-benefit analysis. It shows that cost-benefit analysis is more than a ‘black-box’ of narrow economic calculation; rather it is a technique capable of addressing broader values. The book draws together a range of papers, reports and seminal articles published in Ireland over the past two decades. It should be of interest to policy makers, decision makers, managers, analysts and students of economics and public management.